Browse Peanuts Stories

Today, Georgia Agriculture Commissioner Tyler Harper, in coordination with Governor Brian P. Kemp, the University of Georgia College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, and the Georgia Forestry Commission, announced the preliminary estimate of Hurricane Helene’s economic impact on Georgia agriculture is $6.46 billion. This figure represents the sum of direct crop losses, losses to businesses that support agriculture and forestry, losses to workers in those related industries, and estimated recovery and restoration costs that agricultural businesses will face.

A new study by experts in the University of Georgia’s College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences is seeking to increase the value of Georgia’s peanut crops for new markets while reducing losses caused by aflatoxin, a consistent threat to the No. 1 peanut-producing state in the United States. The four-year, $490,000 grant will take a systems-based approach toward developing high-oil peanut varieties bred to withstand the unique climate and pest pressures of the Southeast.

Ten years ago, the Georgia Peanut Tour welcomed its first visitor from the southern African nation of Malawi, where peanuts are part of the local cuisine but are only grown in small gardens or bought in informal markets. Over the next decade, visitors from Malawi attended the tour every year, traveling halfway around the world to see how farmers, shellers, researchers and others work together to get a large crop of peanuts to consumers every year.

Farmers around the world grow peanuts because the plant adapts to poor soils and produces a crop even as droughts become more common. Smallholder farmers around the world grow the crop on modest plots and cook the nuts into traditional dishes or sell the crop for money to send their kids to school. On April 12, the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and the University of Georgia announced a five-year extension of their collaborative research and outreach work in peanut innovation.

Bart Davis doesn’t seek out accolades or praise, but through an impressive dedication to his farm and the industry, honor found him at this year's Georgia Ag Forecast presentation, where he was recognized as 2023 Georgia Farmer of the Year.

Over the last few decades, water use-related disagreements between Georgia and its surrounding states have held the spotlight in the Southeast. To address the need for conservation, the Agricultural Water Efficiency Team (AgWET) was created to train University of Georgia Cooperative Extension agents to transfer advanced irrigation scheduling knowledge to growers through a unique one-on-one educational approach.

On a warm morning in mid-September, tractor-drawn peanut-digging equipment burrowed beneath the peanut vines on the first of Tift County peanut farmer Greg Davis’s fields. This is the day peanut producers — and University of Georgia Cooperative Extension agents and UGA peanut researchers — work all season for.

From year to year, many row crop producers rotate the crops they plant to reduce pest and disease pressure and to benefit the land, often alternating peanuts with cotton and corn. Peanuts in particular are considered an important cash crop for many farmers.

Whether they show up whole in a candy bar, are transformed into a sandwich spread or lend earthy notes to a spicy curry, peanuts are an important part of foodways in the U.S. and of cuisines from around the world. Georgia is the No. 1 peanut-producing state in the U.S., growing approximately 52% of the peanuts produced in the country in 2021, mostly in the state’s sandy Coastal Plain region.